assessment

It has been estimated – Department for Transport (DFT) – that up to one in three road incidents involve someone at work. Lorry driver, bus driver, representatives, travelling between locations, taxi driver & service engineers etc.

Every week around two hundred road deaths and serious injuries may involve individuals who are driving whilst at work.

Have you considered driving for work or whilst at work under a risk assessment? Have you considered the potential impact to your organisation should a fatality occur whilst one is at work driving a company owned vehicle or driving whilst at work?

The “Health and Safety Executive” and the “DFT” are clear in their messages that health and safety laws will be applied to road incidents. Therefore it is recommended that you consider the following: -

Ensure drivers hold licence to drive – check and confirm every twelve months as a minimum – they may have had incidents that have added point to the license, that you are not aware of.

Set in place a drugs and alcohol policy – not to drink on duty, before duty, inform staff that random screening is to be introduced.

Drivers to complete daily checks on the condition of vehicles. This should include lights

and other visible damage.

Ensure vehicles have appropriate MOT’s and are in date.

Ensure that vehicles have appropriate tax for the class of vehicle and is in date.

Ensure that eye sights are checked, by a competent person, if wearers of prescription

glasses ensure eyes are checked routinely. Eye sight can alter over the years. Do not allow the use of sun / tinted glasses at night.

Risk assessment is now enshrined in many areas of health and safety legislation.

It appears under the “Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999″ – regulation 3. It is found under many other areas such as: -

COSHH Regulations

Manual Handling Regulations

Provision and Use of Work Equipment Regulations

Construction (Design and Management) (As Amended) Regulations

Fire Precautions (Workplace) Regulations

Personal Protective Equipment at Work Regulations

Display screen equipment Regulations

Noise at work Regulations

Make it up as you go regulations

Various asbestos regulations.

This listing is not meant to cover all regulations and is in short format.

You should always ask if in doubt.

The various duties under the “Management of Health and Safety at Work Regulations 1999″ overlaps with other regulations, because of their wide ranging general nature. Where duties overlap, compliance with the more specific regulation will normally be sufficient to comply with the corresponding regulation. For example, the “Manual Handling Regulations” require the assessment of risks, so it could be that you will not have to repeat the exercise for both sets of legislation.

In making risk assessment the following may need to be considered.

The inexperience, lack of awareness or risks of the immaturity of young persons.

The fitting out and layout of the workplace and workstation.

The nature, degree and duration of exposure to physical, biological and chemical agent.

The form, range and use of work equipment and the way in which it is handled.

The organisation of processes and activities.

The extent of health and safety training provided or to be provided to young persons. and others.

Risks from agents, process and works listed in Annex to Council Directive 94/33/EC on the protection of young people at work.

Risk Assessment Process.

Identify the hazards.

Identify who might be harmed.

Evaluate the risks from the identified hazards.

Recording.

Revision and review.

It is not a one-off process, it must be revisited and reviewed on a regular basis. Things happen, environments alter, staff relocate, changes occur. What can happen will happen!